Camp Closes

The U.S. Women’s National Team finished camp this morning with an 8:30 a.m. training so that players could catch mid-day flights. It was the earliest practice in recent memory on the WNT and evoked memories of the days of youth soccer when the players were playing early morning tournament matches and eating orange slices at halftime. Still, the sun was out, practice was sharp and intense, and the training featured some one-v-one drills and ended with a five-v-five tournament and some finishing. All-in-all, it was a fantastic two-week training camp to prepare for the Algarve Cup and Olympic qualifying after that, giving head coach Pia Sundhage and her staff a hard look at almost 40 players during the two weeks. The Algarve Cup roster will be released on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. The USA’s next match is March 5 against China to open the tournament. It will be the second consecutive match the USA has played China, also facing them last Jan. 20 in the final match of the Four Nations Tournament (a 1-0 win). This once again brings us to a Blog break, but we’ll start up again when the team arrives in Portugal for the Algarve Cup, always one of the players’ favorite trips…for the beautiful location, great food and great competition.